The morning was unnervingly quiet, the kind of silence that makes the forest feel alive in a way most people never notice. Eli Mercer adjusted the strap of his camera bag and squinted against the rising sun. The mist clung to the treetops like gauzy cobwebs, curling around the branches in slow, deliberate swirls. He'd been hiking this stretch of forest for years, but today felt different—he couldn't explain why.
The first hint of something wrong came with the birds.
Not a single chirp. Not a single trill. Normally, this early in the morning, the forest would be alive with the tiny orchestra of songbirds, their notes bouncing between the trees, filling the air with a kind of careless cheer. But today, only silence answered him.
Eli crouched beside a moss-covered log, raising his camera slowly. He was hoping to catch a shot of a woodpecker, a rare one that occasionally visited this stretch, but what he saw instead made him freeze.
There, in a clearing thirty feet away, lay a small flock of sparrows—or what remained of them. Their feathers were ruffled, dirt and dried blood streaking the ground beneath them. Their tiny bodies twitched in spasms, the motions jerky and unnatural.
He swallowed hard. "What the hell…" he muttered, keeping his voice low. He edged closer, careful not to disturb them, camera at the ready.
Some of the birds' eyes were wide open, unblinking, reflecting the sunlight in a strange, glassy way. Others had their beaks clamped open as though gasping for air, but there was no sound. No movement beyond the spasms.
Eli's stomach turned. Birds didn't twitch like that unless something was very wrong. Rabies? Poison? He wasn't sure. He had taken a few wildlife biology classes in college, enough to recognize that this was abnormal. The pattern of death didn't make sense either: they were scattered haphazardly, no predator tracks, no signs of struggle.
He crouched lower, zooming in with his lens. One sparrow jerked suddenly, then seemed to twist its neck at an impossible angle, jerking again before lying still. The others followed, almost as if the twitching spread like a rhythm, an unnatural pulse that made his skin crawl.
Eli exhaled slowly, forcing himself to take the photos. He had to document this. Evidence. Whatever it was. He kept his hand steady, but the tremor in his stomach refused to ease.
Then came the sound.
A faint, high-pitched cawing. He froze. The noise was coming from above—larger birds, maybe crows—but there was something off. They didn't land or fly normally; they hovered in the branches, almost perfectly still, their heads cocked at odd angles, watching him. Their cries weren't random; they seemed measured, deliberate, synchronized, like they were listening and responding to each other.
Eli felt a shiver run down his spine. He had photographed wildlife for a living, had spent hours watching predators stalk prey, had even gotten close to wolves in the northern ranges, but nothing—nothing—had ever felt this wrong.
The crows' eyes caught his in the morning light, dark orbs reflecting the rising sun in unsettling ways. They didn't blink. Their beaks opened in unison to produce a shrill, grating sound, then snapped shut. The effect was unnerving, like they were speaking in a language he couldn't comprehend, warning him, or perhaps mocking him.
Instinct took over. He stepped back slowly, careful not to break his line of sight. Then he heard it—a soft scuttling sound on the forest floor. Not leaves moving, not a branch snapping underfoot. Something skittered, small and quick, too fast for him to catch at first glance.
Another twitch from the sparrows. Then another, this one closer to the clearing's edge. His heart thudded in his chest. He raised his camera again, zooming in, shaking with tension. A small brown sparrow jerked its wing unnaturally, then twitched again. But the weirdest part—its eyes were a dull, sickly yellow, not the dark brown he remembered seeing.
Eli's breath hitched. Birds didn't turn yellow-eyed like that. Birds didn't spasm in time with one another. Birds didn't look at you like that.
A sudden rustle behind him made him whirl. Nothing. The forest was still, save for the twitching bodies ahead and the hovering crows above.
He swallowed, trying to steady himself. Maybe he was overreacting. Maybe this was some freak disease, something he hadn't seen before. But even in that rational thought, a part of his mind whispered: it's worse than that.
A sharp caw made him jump. One of the larger crows had dropped from the branch with unnatural precision, landing on the forest floor, not hopping but landing like a predator. It tilted its head at him, cocking it slowly, and then darted forward.
Eli stumbled back, his boots hitting roots and moss. The crow moved faster than it should have, wings tucked close to its body, almost running. His hands shook as he fumbled for his emergency knife. The crow stopped a few feet away, tilting its head again, almost studying him.
Then it shrieked. Not a normal bird shriek, but something sharper, more guttural, like a warning, like the sound had been twisted. And behind it, the other crows began to descend, circling him, their movements unnaturally precise.
He ran.
Branches clawed at his jacket, roots tripped him, and the mist seemed thicker than before, as if the forest itself was conspiring to slow him down. Every glance backward made his heart stop—birds were everywhere, a black, flapping, cawing wave.
He tripped over a log, scraping his palms, and landed hard. The knife skittered out of reach. When he looked up, the crows were gone. Silence. Just the mist, the shadows, and the twitching sparrows scattered across the clearing.
Eli's chest heaved. Sweat dripped down his face. His camera was clutched in his hand, lens cracked from hitting the ground. He checked the photos, zooming in on the sparrows. The yellow eyes glinted back at him from the screen, and the unnatural angles of their bodies made him flinch.
Something was wrong. Something more than disease.
He scrambled to his feet and ran the last mile back to his truck. The forest seemed… heavier, oppressive. He felt eyes on him, like the shadows themselves were watching. His breathing was ragged, his legs burning, but adrenaline kept him moving.
When he reached the edge of the forest, he paused. The town lay ahead, quiet and deceptively normal. Smoke rose from a distant chimney. Children's voices drifted faintly from a schoolyard. Life went on, oblivious to what he had just witnessed.
He tried to tell himself it was a one-off. Maybe a rare parasite, maybe a freak mutation. He had to rationalize it. Birds died every year from something, didn't they? Right?
But deep down, he knew better. Something had sparked in the forest, something that didn't belong.
He climbed into his truck, hands trembling. The ignition turned over, engine roaring to life, and he kept glancing at the trees behind him. Every branch seemed to twitch, every shadow moved with intention.
He drove home slowly, camera on the passenger seat, fingers itching to call someone, to warn someone. But who would believe him? Who could?
By the time he reached the outskirts of town, the first thought that hit him was undeniable and cold in his chest: This is just the beginning.